10 Super Bowl beers that aren’t Bud Light

There are many more interesting beers, with regional flavor, for the big game

By

JasonNotte

Columnist

Anheuser-Busch InBev plans on monopolizing three minutes of Super Bowl Sunday to talk about its beer. We aren’t going to let it.

We don’t begrudge the Belgo-Brazilian multinational its ad spending. After all, it did lay out $1.2 billion in 2011 to take the National Football League’s official beer sponsorship away from MillerCoors. It also plunked down $1.4 billion last year to make sure no one touches that sponsorship until 2022. We can even understand why it would pay $278 million since 2006 for exclusive rights to Super Bowl beer ads, which it’s secured since 1988.

We just don’t find it particularly sporting of them to do so. After all, NFL sponsor McDonald’s
MCD, +0.94%
has to put up with a Taco Bell ad this Sunday. NFL sponsor Hyundai/Kia? It’s stuck in commercial traffic with Buick, Mini, Honda/Acura
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Audi and Toyota
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NFL sponsor Pepsi
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has to put up with hated soda rival Coca-Cola
KO, -1.48%

Meanwhile, Santa Clara, Calif., has more than $1 billion invested in Levi’s Stadium, while San Francisco has to throw $4.8 million at a Super Bowl hosted by a team that left town. Shouldn’t the breweries here get some recognition for their trouble? And what about the Denver Broncos’ hometown? Anheuser-Busch InBev NV
BUD, -0.28%
wants to open a 10 Barrel brewpub right in Coors’ backyard and among the city’s flourishing craft beer community. Don’t they deserve a quick shout-out?

And what about the Carolina Panthers’ home in Charlotte, N.C.? It’s gone from zero breweries to two dozen in less than a decade, despite being in a state where small-brewer laws are tight and the big brewers at Miller Coors just announced plans to shut down a huge plant in Eden. Isn’t that worth a mention?

It is, which is why we’re providing the following selection of beers from each locale. Anheuser-Busch InBev’s brands may get the air time and the fancy NFL logos, but when it comes to the communities that put their hearts, souls and tax dollars into making this game happen, these are your unofficial official beers of Super Bowl 50:

San Francisco/Santa Clara

Nosh With Josh

Anchor Steam Beer, Anchor Brewing Co., San Francisco: When people ask where craft brewing in the U.S. began, a big part of the answer lies in Fritz Maytag’s 1965 takeover of a San Francisco institution founded 80 years earlier. One of his first duties was to revive the brewery’s version of the California Common beer style that Anchor first brewed in 1896. A California Common is a lager marked by a rich amber color, a mellow, bready flavor courtesy of caramel malt and a brewing process that, before the age of refrigeration, required the beer to ferment in shallow pans on the brewery roof and cast steam across the city. A lot of beer-loving neighbors have moved in since, but Anchor and this beer — and the Liberty Ale that was the nation’s first example of bitter, West Coast IPA — remain intrinsically linked to the city they call home.

Gordon Biersch Brewing Co.

Golden Export, Gordon Biersch Brewing Co., San Jose: There aren’t breweries in Santa Clara proper, but adjacent San Jose is teeming with them. Mission Creek, Clandestine, Strike and Santa Clara Valley all call the city home, but this brewery built in 1988 is the big one. Dan Gordon and Dean Biersch originally opened shop in Palo Alto after Gordon’s stint at the Technical University of Munich studying brewing. Adhering to the Reinheitsgebot German beer purity law limiting ingredients to water, malt, hops and yeast, they began brewing traditional beers that immediately struck a chord with drinkers used to far more pale lager. “But isn’t this the place at the mall/airport?” No, Gordon Biersch actually sold off its brewpub chain in 1999, and they’re now run by the folks behind the Rock Bottom chain. The brewery itself is also now owned by the founders of Ultimate Fighting Championship, but Gordon is still the brewer behind the beer. In our opinion, this light, easy-sipping lager is the best summary of what this brewery is all about: crisp, clean, refreshing Teutonic styles with no technical flaws that pair well with garlic fries.

21st Amendment Brewing

Brew Free or Die IPA, 21st Amendment Brewing, San Francisco/San Leandro: It gets very difficult to pick just one — or five — breweries to represent this city. Do you keep it within city limits? Do you stretch out to San Leandro and Drake’s? Do you pay homage to the state’s first brewpub at Buffalo Bill’s in Hayward? Do you hop over to Berkeley and get organic with Bison or Austrian with Trumer? For the sake of both geography and sheer availability, we went with 21st Amendment. Founded in 2000 somewhere between craft beer’s waves of popularity by two brewing students from UC Davis, 21st Amendment was among the earliest craft breweries to use cans and one of the first to can its IPA. With help from contract brewers, 21st Amendment grew well beyond its Bay Area borders and, just last year, finally opened a facility in San Leandro big enough to keep up with demand. Though it likes to tout its Toaster Pastry red ale as more indicative of its new home in an old Kellogg’s factory, its 7% ABV Brew Free or Die is more indicative of the beer that ingratiated itself to San Francisco in the first place.

If you want an idea of where this region’s beer is headed, there’s no greater indicator than Almanac. Founded six years ago, Almanac prides itself on the farm-to-barrel concept that uses Northern California fruit, herbs and grain. As a result, their offerings are extensive. If we had to pick just one, however, we’d have to go with this 7.5% ABV example of the tart, puckering Flanders Red made famous by Rodenbach Grand Cru and Verhaeghe’s Duchesse de Bourgogne. A mix of red ale, California Rainier cherries, wild yeast and San Francisco sourdough starter (nice touch) is aged in oak wine barrels and continues to evolve in the bottle. The result is a biting sour that would not only give New Belgium’s La Folie or Kriek reason to be concerned, but takes Northern California beer a few steps beyond its hop-addled history.

Denver

Wynkoop Brewing Co.

Patty’s Chile Beer, Wynkoop Brewing Co., Denver: Welcome to Colorado, where even the governor used to work at a brewery. Yep, Gov. John Hickenlooper helped found this brewery way back in 1988 and has his place among the state’s craft beer pioneers. In fact, we wanted to feature Wynkoop neighbor and, until recently, owner Breckenridge Brewing on this list, but after its purchase by Anheuser-Busch InBev late last year, it dropped Wynkoop and some of its other brewery holdings. That sits just fine with us, as this 4.2% ABV beauty named for the founder of Denver’s alternative weekly newspaper Westword stands all on its own. Patty’s Chile Beer is a golden ale fermented with Anaheim and ancho peppers for some of that pepper aroma and spice without the burn and is just lovely with everything from a bison burger to a plate of nachos. A-B may not have been able to get its hands on some, but you should.

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